The Mackie ProF22v3 does the pro in its name proud: It's a professional grade 22-channel mixing desk with an FX section, USB compatibility, and zero latency. All this makes it an affordable solution for live bands, project studios, event organisers, and sound engineers mixing music made live on stage. But it's far more than just a compact mixer with a USB port: Paired with the Waveform OEM software bundle, it's a full‑on workstation for high‑resolution recording via USB, be that for streaming setups or for content production. The real key feature? All this is possible with latency‑free direct monitoring. The ProFX22v3 is capable of delivering richly detailed, high‑resolution mixes at sampling rates of up to 192kHz; a major factor in its impressive sound are the ultra‑low‑noise Onyx preamps, which with 60dB of headroom have enough to answer every question a producer could ever ask of them. And, of course, the Mackie ProFX22v3 is another piece of gear with the rock‑solid build quality Mackie is known for.
Just as crucial as its sound quality is the way a mixer is equipped. The ProFX22v3 offers a total of 17microphone inputs, each with a three‑band EQ; the first two are fitted with combo sockets. On these first two channels, high‑Z switches allow musicians playing instruments with low output levels – such as electric guitars or passive electric basses – to plug them straight in. Similarly sensitive is the high‑pass filter at 100Hz, which doesn’t simply cut off everything below that point; instead, those frequencies are reduced gradually at a defined slope. On the Mackie ProFX16v3, that slope is 18dB per octave, meaning that 50Hz is reproduced 18dB lower than 100 Hz. Also on board is a versatile GigFX effects engine with 24 effects designed to add a little extra to voices, instruments, and all kinds of signals. In addition, the unit provides 48 V phantom power – across all channels.
The Mackie ProFX22v3 is a serious pro-grade mixing desk – it can easily handle touring bands with multiple backing singers and a horn section, but will also find many uses installed in nightclubs, concert halls, schools and the like. Either way, it first needs to be connected to a computer via USB (it ships with a suitable cable). Once levels are set, a headroom of around 8dB is usually an effective working range. The blend control allows users to fade between the first USB return from the stereo computer signal and the mixer's inputs; producers can thus monitor just the input, a combination of both sources, or the USB return on its own. This gives the Mackie ProFX22v3 the unique ability to send the signals from all its channels to the computer at once, allowing users to run two different mixes at the same time – for example, one for the engineer themselves and another for the band.
In 1988 Greg Mackie, already a successful co-founder of a pro audio company, founded Mackie Designs Inc. with the goal of producing affordable, high-quality mixers. The company's first official product, the LM-1602 line mixer, was initially produced within the four walls of his home. As sales figures were encouraging, its successor model CR-1604 soon followed - and in 1991 the company finally moved into its first proper production facility. The combination of reliable quality and low prices quickly brought the company enormous success, so that by 1995 Mackie had already sold 100,000 products. In 2003, the company was renamed LOUD Audio, LLC so that there is no longer any confusion between the Mackie brand and its former parent company of the same name.
Included in the package is a download code for Waveform OEM, an award‑winning workstation packed with powerful and creative tools designed to inspire any modern musician. Unlike the lite versions that hardware interfaces sometimes ship with, it's fully licensed and unrestricted. As such, it offers unlimited tracks, advanced functionality, compatibility with all major plug‑ins, and excellent performance across macOS, Windows and Linux. All this means the Mackie ProFX16v3 really hits the desk running, with the DAW Essentials Collection also on board – a set of 16 modern effects plug‑ins that work in any DAW. These plug‑ins use state‑of‑the‑art algorithms and coding techniques to deliver exceptional sound quality in an extremely efficient package, making them suitable for use on a wide range of native computer systems.